Action-packed film fun lined up for 2015

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Steve Payne

Published:13:29Monday 29 December 2014

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Film fans are set for a fascinating 2015 with many movies that are already flagged up for awards.

Below are just a few of the ones I’m eagerly anticipating. Of course, release dates change as distributors attempt to grab the best weeks and try not to clash with other major releases.

Michael Keaton in Birdman

We can be rather more certain what’s happening in the first few months, though, and for January Birdman is heralded as being a virtuoso performance for Michael Keaton.

He plays a washed-up actor looking to rediscover his former fame when he played a super hero.

Foxcatcher is also grabbing attention as an award-winner with an almost unrecognisable Steve Carell, plus Channing Tatum and Mark Ruffalo in a story about brothers training for the 1988 Olympic Games.

Bradley Cooper is looking impressive in clips from American Sniper in which he plays the title role - a man vital on the battlefield who struggles with ordinary family life.

Add Ex Machina - a sci-fi story about artificial intelligence - and Big Hero 6 (in February) - a cartoon sci-fi story about artificial intelligence - and you have a pretty good start to the year.

Plus, of course director Guy Ritchie’s take on the 1960s cult classic The Man from U.N.C.L.E which I watched every week as a kid.

February also has Jupiter Ascending with Mila Kunis, Channing Tatum, which looks good from the trailer - but I’ve been fooled before (eg Skyline).

I loved director Gareth Edwards’ Monsters back in 2010 and now we have Monsters: Dark Continent which is keeping to the same low-key but very powerful formula.

World Of Warcraft pops up in March - I’m not a fan of the game itself but I do enjoy the work of director Duncan Jones (Moon).

The second Avengers film (Age Of Ultron) pops up in April, hopefully building on the excellent first film.

And in June we have Jurassic World. My colleagues got very excited at the trailer for this. The film is set 22 years after the first one where dinosaurs are part of a theme park. But hold on, a new attraction turns out to be more interested in creating mayhem than fun.